A Boulder businessman who pleaded guilty to theft in Lafayette in 2008 and again earlier this year in Boulder was sentenced to 10 years in prison after violating the terms of his deferred sentence by trying to start up another online company.

Austin Slattery Veith, 33, also was sentenced to 25 years of probation and ordered to pay $1.08 million in restitution by Boulder District Judge Thomas Mulvahill on Friday.

Veith pleaded guilty to one count of felony theft in 2008 and, as a condition of that plea deal, was granted a four-year deferred sentence beginning in February 2009 and was barred from engaging in business transactions without the approval of his probation officer.

But in June 2011, Veith was arrested again in New York and extradited to Colorado after police say he diverted $450,000 meant to fund Internet startups into his personal accounts, according to court records.

Veith, who once owned Boulder tanning salon Sol Tan, started online frequent flier mileage tracking website UsingMiles.comin 2008 with a former classmate at the University of Colorado business school using seed money they attained after graduating from the Boulder TechStars entrepreneurial program.

Records show that as investors put money into Veith's venture, Veith instead used the money to rent a $10,000-a-month apartment in New York City and a $4,500-a-month "party house" in Breckenridge. He also wired nearly $85,000 to various Las Vegas casinos and spent $23,532 of investor funds in November 2009 alone on clothes, ski lift tickets, hotels, Apple iTunes and plane tickets.

Veith pleaded guilty to theft and securities fraud -- both Class 3 felonies -- in that case, and was scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 26, when he would have had his deferred sentence from his 2008 plea revoked.

But on Sept. 6, a woman came forward and said she had started an online company earlier this year with Veith -- who was out of jail on $200,000 bond -- before she found out about his criminal history, according to a police report.

According to the report, the woman said Veith approached her about starting an online business called VitaPlanner that would ship vitamins to customers. The website led customers to a page where they could invest in the company to help get it started.

Veith was subsequently arrested Sept. 12 for failing to comply with the conditions of his 2008 sentence, since he did not tell his probation officers about his involvement with VitaPlanner and never notified his co-investor about his criminal history.

Boulder is pretty good at producing rock bands, and by "rock," we mean the in-your-face, guitar-heavy, leather-clad variety — you know, the good kind. For a prime example, look no farther than BANDITS. Full Story